CHALLENGE

Often when God closes one door, invariably another one opens. But the challenge I find most often the hardest is not the closed door but the disappointment that I immediately feel. The insecurity it wells up inside me. The sense of failure that so often follows a loss. While I am not inclined to share the closing door, I am eager to see what is in store for the future. As unsure as I am about everything right now including where God wants me to go to church, I am sure that I am under angels wings protected from the elements. The elements are this life we live and how we live it. As I wrote about crossroads a few months ago, I once again (now that things have begun to settle) find myself quietly sitting at the four corners, sitting in the road, knees to my chin, head looking out, squinting in the harsh sunlight and dusty prairie whipping around me and ask "what now"?

Most people can count on one hand how many times they have uprooted their lives for a new job or relationship or cause. It is not a common thing nor is it "normal".  I am certain there are statistics on this phenom but really it is besides the point. As I sit at this intersection, curious as to how this will all play out, I think about the kids out there that feel this way immediately as they hit puberty. They sit at a crossroads everyday wondering will they be liked at school? Will they be popular and part of the accepted crowd or will they be ostracized because they are different, smart, unusually talented or attractive or unattractive? Will they be pushed and prodded into trying drugs, alcohol, gambling, internet porn? Will they step out their front doors only to be snatched up and sold into the sex trade slavery that is a very big reality right now? Their world is constantly filled with what if', if only, and why nots!  Their world is similar to our world except for one major factor, they are just kids. I say that not to be condescending but to be factual in that how and what they face is received, perceived and distorted by that very fact.

Every day they wake up and a new challenge awaits them and it is not something they can expect because they are kids. Kids shouldn't have to wake up in the morning and think about will I be pressured to smoke a joint or try crack; will I find out my friend just committed suicide when no one even grasped he/she was depressed or why; will  my Dad beat the crap out of my Mom again today or will I have to stand up for my sister and take the beating so she isn't abused? Today, will I walk out my front door and be grabbed by somebody, drugged and live a life I did not choose because the world creates monsters of greed, caring not how they attain it but how much they will gain because of it?  Today will my life as a good Christian youth, filled with the Faith that moves mountains, be shattered by the sin of this world and those that choose death over life?

When secular attempts to work with faith-based, it usually fails. It fails because we live in a PC world with PC rules and PC mentality. Will this person's rights be trampled on so that a particular faith or belief can be shared, so that the receiver can CHOOSE for themselves what life to choose. I have spent time, albeit I am no theologian, studying the various faiths and religions. And in all but one, there is a running theme. The theme that if we do enough good, treat each other with enough love and kindness, if we do enough deeds for humanity and each other, or if we give enough money....then we achieve the Gift of God's Grace and we will go to heaven, nirvana, next life or whatever. All of them tell us that it is through ourselves that we achieve God's favor hence heaven bound we go.  Excluding Christianity. Christianity, at its heart is not about anything we/I can do but what Christ did for US/ME and our acceptance of that fact. When the secular world, which includes people of all faiths and religions simply hear the term Faith-Based, antennae's are raised and logic, law and legalism take the place of the invisible, immeasurable, incredible belief in God, in Jesus Christ.

But I believe that God's vision for our children transcends the barriers we have put in place and goes beyond our human imaginations of what our children need. His vision, which I only get a glimpse of here and there, is like Him, larger than life, greater than the heavens and the earth, beyond universes and beyond our humanity and our minds ability to capture just an infinitesimal idea of who and what God is. As God is in everything so too is God in each of us. To what degree we accept this, is our human heart Choice. Our children need to know what the choices are, they need a place to learn about those choices, and they need to be shown it in the same way Christ did - through Love, through Faith, through Hope. In no other religion do we hear this consistent message. How many of us would sacrifice our only child so that all of humanity would know salvation from our very own sin? Are you an Abraham? Are you the Isaac? Genesis 22 God commands Abraham to take his only son to the top of the mountain and make a living sacrifice of him to God. Abraham, obedient to God, does exactly that. Now frankly how many of us, trust whatever God you believe in, trust GOD enough to do this same thing and know that He will provide a suitable offering rather than take our child?  

So I ask you this, "Do you Believe in GOD?" or "Do you Believe GOD!" "Do you Trust in GOD?" or "Do you Trust GOD!"  I BELIEVE GOD. I believe that His word is the way the truth and the light for all of us. I believe GOD when His word tells me that He has plans for Good and not for Evil (Jeremiah 29:11-15). I TRUST GOD with my life and that means every little detail of it. When I felt the leading to come here to NY, it was important that I have a place that would accommodate my pets. However, I was fully prepared to give them up (as they are his and not mine - ie sacrifice) in order to be obedient to this calling for the BFF.  

God does not want you to sacrifice your children on an alter, He wants you to give your heart and life to Him who created it. In so doing, a TRUST is formed and Belief is strengthened and Hope springs eternal. Will bad things happen - you bet! Will wrong choices have unavoidable consequences - without a doubt! Can we make a difference by simply setting aside our differences and replace them with what we have in common, so that our children, and their children will BE - no question!

I have created a special page to this message to share what it means to be an At-Risk kid. This was real life and what is in this open letter only scratches the surface. Make a commitment today - a commitment to something bigger than we are; humble yourself to a place of love for our children, all of them, not just the ones you birthed....present them to the one true living God as a pure and holy sacrifice, and watch as God provides endless possibilities at the alter.

Pebbles out....